Κεφ. Ζ'
The Deception of Gluttony
The thought of gluttony uses fear of illness and the examples of others to tempt the monk into abandoning his ascetic discipline.
The thought of gluttony suggests to the monk that he should quickly abandon his ascetic discipline, painting a picture of stomach, liver, and spleen trouble, dropsy, a long illness, a shortage of necessities, and no doctors to be found. And it often reminds him of certain brothers who have suffered from these ailments. Sometimes it even persuades those who have suffered in this way to visit those practicing self-restraint, tell them all about their misfortunes, and explain how their ascetic discipline left them in such a condition.
Read the original Latin
Ὁ μὲν τῆς γαστριμαργίας λογισμὸς ἔκπτωσιν ταχεῖαν τῷ μοναχῷ τῆς ἀσκήσεως ὑποβάλλει· στόμαχον καὶ ἧπαρ καὶ σπλῆνα καὶ ὕδρωπα διαγράφων, καὶ νόσον μακράν, καὶ σπάνιν τῶν ἐπιτηδείων, καὶ ἰατρῶν ἀπορίαν. Φέρει δὲ αὐτὸν πολλάκις καὶ εἰς μνήμην ἀδελφῶν τινων τούτοις περιπεσόντων τοῖς πάθεσιν. Ἔστι δὲ ὅτε καὶ αὐτοὺς ἐκείνους τοὺς πεπονθότας παραβάλλειν ἀναπείθει τοῖς ἐγκρατευομένοις, καὶ τὰς ἑαυτῶν ἐκδιηγεῖσθαι συμφοράς, καὶ ὡς ἐκ τῆς ἀσκήσεως τοιοῦτοι γεγόνασιν.
The Praktikos companion
A daily portion of stillness
Chosen Portion delivers one short contemplative reading and a guided moment of silence each day — the ascent, one step at a time.
Chosen Portion is the paced doorway into this collection: it portions the dense mystical treatises into one daily reading plus guided silence, exactly as the 14-day plan teaches.
- Daily bite-sized excerpts from the contemplative classics, never a wall of text
- A built-in timed stillness practice that grows from 2 minutes to 10
- Gentle progression through the tradition — the app remembers where you are on the ascent